A/N: Normally I say thanks for the reviews here, but as I've managed to get myself on someone's shit list, and have had lots of bad reviews in the last few days, I'll just say thanks to the 4 readers who did have something nice to say! xx

Supermarché

[He gave the bottle a suspicious look, "Because I'm one hundred percent sure it's going to taste like dirt."]

Sirius decided he needed a shower after their little moment in the buanderie, and had asked Hermione if she would look for something cooler for him to wear, as he'd only had a spare t-shirt in his backpack. It was nearly 2pm now and the day just seemed to be getting hotter. Hermione had been sure it would have rained by now, but the clouds were holding.

She could definitely understand why Sirius hadn't put his jeans on today. She'd offered to transfigure them into shorts but he'd shaken his head, muttering about them being 'lucky,' and how you shouldn't mess with that.

So she went looking in Bill's wardrobe again, she found a couple of pairs of shorts that looked like they might fit, although as Bill was rapidly approaching fifty, he wasn't quite as narrow in the hips as he once was and certainly had a bit more padding around the middle than Sirius did, they would probably still be a little big. She also got a t-shirt, since the one he was wearing in the crash yesterday was ripped and stained and the one he'd had on this morning was now in an unpleasant screwed up ball in front of the washing machine.

She found her mind totally occupied by flashes of his skin as he'd pulled it off over his head, and she smiled dazedly to herself. What the hell had she been thinking? Clearly not thinking was more likely the problem.

They left for the supermarket, a very modern Carrefour on the other side of town, not long afterward. Hermione thought that the sight of Sirius Black in shorts and flip-flops (also from Bill's wardrobe) was one of the most unexpectedly strange things she'd ever seen.

"It's so cool you can drive," Sirius said, as they trundled down the long limestone driveway. It was bumpy with potholes but the grit had mostly compacted into two tire tracks to follow, a cloud of pale dust billowing up behind them. She watched it wafting away over the field in the rearview mirror.

"It's one of those things about being a muggleborn," Hermione said, turning out onto the narrow road. "I always wanted to learn how to drive. How did you get your bike? I've always wondered that," she said. "I never asked you before –"

"Before I died?" he finished her sentence, and shook his head in disbelief. "That's so fucking weird."

"Are you okay?" she asked. "You seem very relaxed about it."

"I just feel like there's too much to worry about," he lifted his shoulders in a nonchalant way. "I'm alive now, that's what matters."

"That's probably the right attitude," she nodded. She didn't know how she would handle knowing that her death would occur, in battle, within the next twenty years.

"I got my bike from my uncle," Sirius said, clearly not wanting to dwell on his impending doom. "He left me everything, including the bike. It's older than me by a year. A '58 Triumph Thunderbird," he smiled fondly. "He was quite a lot like me, I think. I'm realising it more as I get older; just little things that he said and did, but he never got disowned. Slytherin self-preservation and all that," he rolled his eyes. "Although my nasty mother still struck him off the family tree when he gave me all her inheritance."

"Her inheritance?"

"Or Reggie's I suppose, since I was already disowned. Alphard was Pollux's eldest son. It's complicated, but the fortune had been split between old Phineas Nigellus's boys. Pollux, my maternal grandfather, was much better with the finances he inherited from his father than my paternal grandfather was with what he got. So, the lion's share of the Black fortune came down through Alphard, and he managed somehow to give most of it to me, even though I'd been disowned. Including the bike."

Hermione took her eyes off the road to look at him, even she was struggling to follow the complicated explanation.

He let out a little laugh at her expression. "If there's one thing to know about pure bloods, it's that we all know who's in line for the gold, no matter how convoluted. Not that anyone ever talks about it."

She shook her head. "Anyway, did the bike already fly when you got it?"

"No, Alphard just rode it around London mostly. I put the flying charms on it."

"That must have been difficult. Had you seen other flying vehicles before?" Hermione was thinking of the old Ford Anglia. She'd never really considered that there could be hundreds of flying vehicles around the place.

He shook his head, looking a bit self-conscious. "You can't arrest me right?"

"Well, yes, I definitely could," Hermione said, but she smiled. "But I'm not going to."

"Cool," he grinned. "The flying thing… it was all James's fault really. He reckoned his Silver Arrow was faster, and he was right, but I thought it was because of friction, like the tyres on the road?''

Hermione nodded, realising she'd opened a can of worms by asking about the bike, his enthusiasm for the subject was a bit overwhelming. He was still talking, apparently not requiring breath when tales of motorbike tomfoolery were being told.

"Because I'd already done a bit to the motor to make it faster, so I figured it was because there was more resistance, so I sorted out how to reduce the weight and drag and stuff, and then modified the charm they used to use on carpets, have you ever seen one of those?"

She shook her head, but he didn't give her a chance to speak.

"Anyway, did that and it worked. Fucking brilliant." he finished happily.

"And did you prove James wrong?" she asked, wondering how much more story there was to come.

"Ha, no," he said, but it didn't seem to bother him. "Silver Arrows are mental fast, pretty uncontrollable too. James broke his arm and his collarbone when he first got it, and he's a bloody good flyer," he looked at her with a grimace. "I was too chicken to even get on it after that. I mean, I did eventually, but yeah, mad things… They're a bit wild."

"Oh," Hermione had never known that brooms could be like that. The seventies must have been a crazy time.

They arrived at the supermarket, and Sirius's eyes were quite wide as they pulled into a parking space. "This is a supermarket?" He asked, clearly shocked. "Looks more like the airport in London!"

Hermione laughed. "Heathrow is a bit bigger than this now," she said. "It's bigger than this whole town."

"No, not Heathrow," Sirius said, shaking his head. "There's another one, south."

"Gatwick?" She suggested, impressed that he even knew of one airport, let alone two.

"That's it," he said nodding. "It looks like this."

"Also as big as a small town now," Hermione told him.

"Oh," he shrugged. "Well, there must be loads of food in there," he put his hand on his stomach. "Let's go shopping before I starve to death."

Hermione found it very strange to be pushing a shopping trolley around this clean, modern and muggle grocery store with Sirius Black in tow. He seemed completely spellbound by the place. Were supermarkets so different in his time? She felt unpleasantly like his mother as they went through the produce section and he turned his nose up at all the fresh food set out. "You made me eat salad last night," he complained.

"Yeah, well, some of us aren't twenty one," she said a bit huffily. "I could eat whatever I liked then too."

He frowned at her, not understanding. "You should always eat what you like."

She just shook her head. She really didn't want to get into a conversation about healthy food choices for vanity reasons in the middle of the supermarket. But she still added tomatoes and lettuce to the trolley. Sirius was wandering around with his hands in the pockets of his borrowed shorts. They were a bit baggy on him but he just looked like a beach bum, even though they were quite far from any decent swimming beaches.

He'd stopped in front of the huge wall of different fruit juices, taking in all the different choices with a look of awe on his face. He'd tied his damp hair in its messy knot again, and Hermione thought that he really didn't look out of place at all. A couple of young men passed her, one with a full beard and an extremely well groomed haircut; his mate sporting stubble like Sirius, with the bottom half of his head shaved and the top half tied up. They were both in t-shirts, shorts, and flip-flops too.

The only giveaway that Sirius wasn't quite at home was the way he was peering closely at the juice labels. He turned to look at her as she approached, disbelief etched on his face, pointing at one of the bottles. "This one says it has beetroot and sweet potato in it, what the hell?"

"Shall we get it?" she suggested, wondering what on earth it would taste like.

He looked at her like she was mad, but then he grinned. "Absolutely," he said enthusiastically. He picked up the bottle and put it in the trolley. As he did, he said, in a voice that she thought might have been an impression of someone, "What did you do in the future, Sirius?"

"Well, Moony, I drank potato juice," he said in his normal voice.

"We call that Vodka, Padfoot," he continued, in quite a good replication of Remus's dry tone, or what Hermione remembered of it anyway.

"No, sweet potato," he went on, being himself again. "With beetroot. It was delicious."

Hermione started laughing and he looked at her, trying to be serious. "I mean, I'll obviously have to lie and tell them it doesn't taste like dirt, right?" He gave the bottle a suspicious look. "Because I'm one hundred percent sure it's going to taste like dirt."

Hermione was laughing so much by this point a mother and her small child were casting her concerned glances.

"Come on," she said, feeling silly and lightheaded, and trying not to laugh at the stupid juice in her trolley. They went through the butchery, where Sirius was much more keen on the offerings, and convinced her to buy steak for their dinner. Then on to the bakery. She should have guessed that this would be a bit overwhelming for him. Even she found this section of this supermarket very impressive, and she was quite used to it.

He walked around the glass fronted cabinets rather mesmerised, looking at the pastries and cakes, desserts and biscuits, and beautiful little sweet things that Hermione had never seen outside of France. She was sure the little bakery in the high street sold even more fiddly fancy things, but these ones were perfectly fancy enough for her. Sirius almost had his nose on the glass, looking at the lines of colourful macarons.

"Shall we get some?" Hermione asked.

"Nah," Sirius said, standing straight again, looking disappointed. "No blue ones, let's get one of those instead," he pointed to black forest gateau in a box. Hermione picked it up and added it to the trolley.

They went up and down the isles after that, and eventually, after several circuits, Hermione decided they had enough food for the next few days. Until Harry arrived at least.

She didn't know what she'd do with herself once Sirius went back; she was meant to be here for a whole week. She wondered too how she'd feel when he was gone, because even if she didn't include their little tryst in the buanderie, she hadn't had a day she enjoyed so much in a very long time. It made her quite sad to think that she'd never get to see him again.

They went through the checkouts where Sirius was distracted watching people at the self-serve isles. Hermione had decided to go through the operated one because they had quite a lot of things, random snacks and foodstuffs that Sirius had been interested in. Apparently, he was going to spend all his time eating until he went home.

Sirius was so distracted watching the people check and pack their own shopping that he didn't even notice the way the pretty check-out girl was eyeing him appreciatively. She and the girl bagging had shared a consprital look as he'd lounged against the counter, hands in his pockets again.

Hermione had a very bizarre moment of pride imagining what these fresh-faced creatures would think if they knew what she and Sirius had been doing an hour ago. They probably thought she was his colleague, or aunt, or mother. Well, they might have, until he leaned in close to her ear, his hand on the small of her back and asked quietly. "How do they stop them from stealing stuff?" with a nod in the direction of the customers packing their own bags.

Hermione nearly laughed at the disappointed expression their check-out girl wore, obviously thinking he was whispering something much more exciting in her ear.

"I'll explain later," she said to him, thinking the whole system of security cameras and weighted bagging areas might be a bit complicated for a whispered conversation.

Then their weird veggie juice was scanned and Sirius turned his smile on the check-out girl. "Does anyone ever buy that?" he asked.

She frowned at him, "En français?" She asked shortly, apparently his pretty face wasn't an excuse for rudeness. Hermione should have warned him, the locals here thoroughly disliked tourists not making an effort to speak their language.

"Je suis tellement désolé," he apologised smoothly, his charming smile firmly in place, and Hermione wanted to roll her eyes, of course he spoke French. "Je me demandais juste si quelqu'un achetait jamais le jus de saleté?"

"Jus de saleté?" The check-out girl repeated, and Hermione realised Sirius had called it 'dirt juice'. The girl looked down at the bottle, and then back at Sirius's face, her smile a bit unsure, "légumes sans dents?"

Sirius laughed, genuinely entertained by the reply. Hermione's French couldn't quite keep up, and he must have realised this because he translated, "Veggies for people with no teeth." He flashed his own with a broad smile, eyes twinkling, at the two supermarket girls who were now giggling. Hermione just shook her head, her own smile much more rueful. She should have known he'd enjoy the attention.

Once the groceries were all back in the trolley in four tidily packed brown paper bags, Hermione waved her card over the reader, and the check-out girl handed her the receipt.

"Merci," Hermione said, tucking her wallet away again.

Sirius had taken control of the trolley and gave the girls a little wave as they departed, saying jauntily, "merci jolies dames," which made them both giggle again.

"Any other languages you can flirt so proficiently in?" Hermione asked lightly, as they reached the doors for the parking lot. Sirius was half riding on the trolley, one flip-flopped foot balanced on the cross bar as he coasted along, hurriedly having to jump off and skid to a stop as the glass doors took a moment longer than expected to open automatically.

"I'm quite good in English,'' he said slyly, with a quick side-eye which made Hermione laugh again.

They were hit by a wall of hot air as the doors slid open, their time in the cool air-conditioned supermarket had made Hermione forget just how oppressive the day was outside. The sky was so black it almost looked like twilight and there was a distant rumble of thunder as they crossed the car park. Sirius was scooting along on the trolley again, much faster than he'd done inside the shop.

Hermione sighed resignedly as she watched him nearly collide with her car, stopping just in time. He waited for her to join him, leaning against the back, one foot up on the bumper, looking up at the black sky. "It's going to be a big storm," he said. "Did you hear the thunder?"

"Yes," she replied, digging her key from her bag and pushing the button to make the boot door lift. Sirius jumped with fright at the movement, springing off the car and looking at it in surprise.

Hermione smirked to herself.

"How'd you do that?'' he asked, watching suspiciously as she clearly didn't have her wand out.

She held up the little black key. "Muggle magic," she said. They put the groceries in the boot, and Sirius delighted in zooming across the carpark, both feet on the back of the empty trolley, crashing rather dramatically into the line of ones already parked in the corral.

"I thought grocery shopping was supposed to be boring," Sirius said as he got back in the car. "This was excellent."

"You'll like the next stop better," she said. "Bottle store, for cigarettes and drinks."

It wasn't really a bottle shop like you'd find at home, much more of a wine merchant. The one in the high street was pretty much all wine, but they did have a cold section for nice beers and a few different spirit choices. Hermione liked it better than buying it from the supermarket, even though it probably cost more. Ron had always said she was a snob about it, but she just liked the little shop.

Sirius nodded in acknowledgement of her plan. "Then eat, right? I'm going to faint if you don't feed me soon, it's been a strenuous day," he gave her another little sly side-eye.

She felt her lips twist slightly, restraining her smile to say, "I'm not sure why I'm responsible for feeding you."

"I can make coffee,'' he defended himself. "And like, sandwiches and stuff, but not proper food."

"I'm no great cook," Hermione admitted. "My ex-mother-in-law was so fabulous I never bothered trying to live up to the expectations. I can still do your steak justice for dinner though."

"Well, thank Merlin for that," he sighed dramatically.

Hermione drove along the main tourist route to get to the bottle shop, the bank of the Seine on their right, wide and glassy, still reflecting the dark sky ominously. The old port buildings that lined the road on their left were all whitewashed and pretty, retaining their old charm despite the new signage and lighting that decorated them now that they were shops.

Hermione parked the car almost outside the door of the bottle shop. The town wasn't very busy today. As they got out of the car, Sirius sniffed the air in a very dog-like fashion, his nose high. Hermione could smell it too; there was a bakery next door to the bottle shop. Sirius grinned at her across the roof of the car, and tilted his head towards the bakery. "Fags then food?"

"Sure," she said. He must really be starving if he couldn't wait to get home to eat.

Inside the bottle store Sirius asked what Harry liked to drink and decided that would do for him too. So they went to the counter with a couple of bottles of reisling for Hermione - she was off the red - and a large box of Stella for Sirius to share with Harry when he arrived. Hermione was pleased that he was looking forward to Harry's arrival. She thought that Harry getting to know this version of Sirius would give him a much better idea of the man his parents had appointed godfather. He was so different from the one who'd spent so long in prison. So long that he'd lost part of himself.

Hermione let Sirius handle the request for cigarettes since he was so bloody proficient in French. Then she tapped her card again to pay and they left for the bakery.

As they paused to put their drinks in the car, Hermione looked up at the sky again. She must have sensed something because there was suddenly a flash of light across the dark clouds; lightening, bright and sharp, reflecting in the river, lighting the whole street.

Sirius swore, dropping the box of beers onto the back seat and drawing his wand in one quick movement from his waistband. She hadn't even known he'd had it with him. He had it trained in the direction of the river, arm extended, his other shoulder back, his feet slightly apart. The standard defensive stance.

"Sirius," she hissed, stepping closer to him, shielding his wand from the few muggles on the pavement.

His eyes flicked to her; they were almost unrecognisable. The cheerful bloke she'd known all day was suddenly gone. This Sirius was focused, cautious, and tense. It was a bit frightening to see him switch so suddenly. She felt like she was looking up at the Sirius she had known as a teenager. All of this in a moment, before there was a huge echoing clap of thunder that rolled across the sky and Sirius, wand still raised, jumped, but seemed to realise that it was the weather and not magical attack after all.

"Fuck," he breathed. "Sorry … I –"

Hermione put her hand on his wand arm, he still hadn't lowered it. "Food?" she suggested, deciding it was best not to make a big deal about it. He seemed shaken now. His head twitched as he looked from side to side, still not calm.

Spell Shock? she wondered, she'd seen enough of it after the second war, mostly among Ministry workers and Hogwarts students; the people who'd lived in fear and had been subjected to the Death Eaters' violent forms of subjugation. It could explain why he didn't like to be alone at night; nightmares were a common symptom too.

"Food," he agreed, finally letting his wand drop. He put it back in the waistband of his shorts and gave Hermione a shaky impression of his usual grin.

They went into the bakery and Sirius was very quiet as they looked at all the food, so quiet in fact that Hermione actually heard his stomach rumble as he eyed a fat ham and cheese roll. They got their food and got back in the car. Hermione cranked the air conditioning up and pulled out into the road, she pushed the volume button up on the radio so that Sirius wouldn't feel like he needed to talk.

However, beside her, Sirius was a blur of movement as he finally got some food in his mouth, there was absolutely no way he could have talked anyway. There was just the sound of crinkling paper bakery bags and rather indecent groaning coming from his side of the car. After a few minutes he held out half a sandwich to her, and she took it gratefully. He wasn't the only one who hadn't eaten today.

They had just left the edge of town, where the road narrowed down to an unmarked strip of tarseal, when the sky finally opened. Sparse fat drops at first, and then suddenly a sheet of water hit the car, a deluge of summer rain so heavy that even though she slammed the wipers on as fast as they would go, Hermione couldn't see where the road went.

"Circe's tits!" Sirius exclaimed, as she pulled over to the verge, stopping the car. The rain thundered down all around them, so loud on the roof she couldn't even hear the radio any more. The world outside the windows was just a green blur. The aircon was starting to fog the window on the inside as the rain changed the temperature of the windshield.

"Goodness!" Hermione said, shocked by the sound and intensity of it. She looked over at Sirius who'd stopped stuffing his face to watch the rain. "Any food left?" she asked.

"Yes," he said, slightly indignantly, sifting through the bags on his lap. "The other half of that sandwich, and there's this thing." He held the bag up so she could see inside, finding a cream filled crepe.

It was probably just because she was so famished, but she honestly felt like the ham and egg sandwich was the best thing she'd ever tasted. Shortly to be outranked by the crepe.

They ate quietly for a few minutes, the rain still too heavy to see through, the windows becoming more and more misty as the cold air in the car from the aircon built. Then, just as Hermione was sucking a bit of whipped cream off her thumb, Sirius said. "If you told me this morning that we'd be parked up in a foggy car, on the side of the road this afternoon, I would not have expected a bakery binge to be the reason."

Hermione snorted. "No, probably not." She continued to watch the rain as she said, "I hope it doesn't make it weird for you, when you meet me as a kid, knowing what we did."

"I hadn't thought of that,'' he said slowly. "I wasn't really thinking at all to be honest, I get a bit carried away sometimes." His tone was almost apologetic. "But that could be weird, how much younger than me are you?"

"I was born in Seventy-nine."

"Oh, twenty years," Sirius grimaced. "Yep, that will definitely be weird."

"More weird than the current eighteen?" Hermione asked, flipping her finger between them.

"Two years more?" he joked, but then shook his head. "Nah, I'm an adult, it's totally different. If I'm old enough to fight people to the death, I'm definitely old enough to shag whoever I fancy."

"Hmm," Hermione hedged. She did agree with him, but it was still quite difficult to get her head around. If this had happened when he was seventeen, and she was thirty five? Creepy. And she remembered being thirty five, it felt like last week.

"I already told you, don't overthink it," he said dismissively.

"I don't think you get to tell me anything, actually," Hermione replied shortly, not sure why she was suddenly feeling annoyed.

He made a disbelieving noise in the back of his throat and gave her an almost scornful look. "Are we going to have an argument about getting each other off?" He asked, "because that is fucking ridiculous."

"Um … okay," she leaned back in her seat, putting space between them and feeling rather stunned by his hostile tone.

"Well, it is," he continued belligerently. "I'm the best bloody rebound shag you could ever hope for – " But then he waved a panicked hand, suddenly awkward, animosity gone, his teeth digging into his bottom lip for a second as he frowned. "Hold on, that came out wrong –" he said hastily, "I just meant that you're all worried about the Prophet and shit, well, no one will ever know about me will they? I'm dead."

"This is getting weirder," Hermione said carefully, her agitation fading as he corrected himself, obviously worried that he'd offended her. It kind of had, but also, he was right. No strings attached, physical satisfaction with an extremely attractive man, yes, it probably was just what she needed.

He shrugged. "It's true though. Everyone knows when you break up you need to go on a bender and have a torrid affair."

Then suddenly, Hermione wasn't annoyed at all anymore. "Torrid?" She laughed at his choice of word. "I'm more ice cream and chick flicks."

He shrugged again, still not looking completely at ease. "Well, how's that working out for you?"

"Fine," she muttered, it wasn't fine, it was terrible. "Although, it will be gateau and chick flicks tonight."

"Oh?" he said interestedly. "What are we watching?"

"Given that there are forty years of films for you to catch up on, I'm thinking you might not know it," Hermione said. The rain was easing off now, but only slightly.

"As long as there're no more pop songs by the Clash I'm sure it will be fine."

It was funny how much that had bothered him, Hermione thought. "That song is still quite political," she said, trying to make him feel better about the mainstream demise of a band that obvious meant something to him. "And punk was sort of dying by then…" this drew a scandalised look from Sirius, and she hurried on. "Anyway, I don't actually have a film in mind, but there are lots of dvds at the house, and Netflix has plenty too."

"Okay," he said, easily. "Sounds good." He grinned expectantly at her, "I'm pretending to understand that sentence by the way, did you believe me?"

"I did," she laughed quietly. "Well played."

"Seriously though," he went on, returning to the previous topic. "I'm sure you don't look like this as a kid," his eyes lingered on the slight cleavage showing at her neckline. "I'm confident I will be able to seperate the two," he patted her knee in an odd chummy way before he said. "Besides, I'll probably have drunk most of this little experience out of my memory by the time I meet you anyway."

"That is true," Hermione said, pensively. "You did drink a lot of whiskey."

"Did I?" Sirius asked. This seemed to concern him, his good mood evaporating as quickly as it had come.

"Yeah," she confirmed, wishing she hadn't said it. "It's complicated though, I can't tell you more sorry."

"Whiskey makes me forget,'' he murmured, looking out the window again. "I don't drink it for fun."

"Oh," she said, the Sirius she'd known certainly had a lot of traumatic things to forget. She thought for a moment how tragic it was that he was already "drinking to forget" at twenty-one. It was no wonder he was such a wreck of a person by the time Hermione met him.

The memory of Christmas Eve in Grimmauld Place's library suddenly came back to her again. "I have this strange memory," she said tentatively. "I'd completely forgotten it until yesterday. It was Christmas Eve in Ninety-five, and you were half asleep with a whiskey in your hand, and you said to me "I know you had to, I forgive you" and that was it. You were snoring again. I didn't get it at the time, I just thought you were drunk."

"That's strange," Sirius said, turning back to her again, a frown pulling uncomfortably across his forehead. "Sorry for being a nutcase. Whiskey right?" Then looked even more worried. "You would have only been sixteen?"

"Yes, my birthday is in September. Why?"

"Just thinking that it's a bit creepy. I would have been thirty six, why was I passed out drunk around a sixteen year old? Didn't it freak you out?"

"Not really. It was Christmas Eve," she said, trying to gloss over it a bit. "Big family do, all the adults were drinking. Not a big deal."

"Oh, right," he said. "I wonder if it was about this?" he waved his hand again, encompassing 'this'. "Did I really never tell you anything?"

She shook her head. "Nothing."

"And I suppose this is why," There was a slightly glassy look to his eyes now, as though his mind was far away. "You've just told me I told you nothing, so now I'm deciding to tell you nothing?"

"Now you're making me want to drink," Hermione half laughed.

"I just want a fag," he said, observing the rain washed window with that same distant stare.

"Not in the car," Hermione said at once.

He wasn't phased, shrugging a shoulder up. "Well, I'm not getting out in this."

"Maybe you should quit," she suggested.

"Ha-ha," he deadpanned, coming back to himself. "No way. Smoking is cool."

Hermione raised an eyebrow at this statement. "The kids don't think that any more, you know."

"The kids," he grinned. "You think you're so old."

"I feel old sometimes," Hermione admitted. "But at the same time, not at all. If I think about everything that has happened since I left school, how much the world has changed, then yeah, I definitely feel like I've seen a lot. I've been part of so many changes, had to change my own thinking so many times, things I used to think were okay that just aren't."

"Like what?" he asked, interestedly. "I feel like the world has gotten more violent, but I don't think the magical world has changed much in the last century, not since muggleborns were given full rights."

"The differences now are more subtle," Hermione said. "Our world is mixing so much more with the muggle one. Lots of us have phones and televisions now, although mainly the people who came of age after the war, they don't really remember the old life."

"Don't the muggles notice?"

"No, thankfully, muggles are very good at ignoring things that are too big to deal with," she was thoughtful for a moment. "I'm not completely sure, but I'd say the day is coming where we don't hide it anymore. Maybe not in my lifetime, but I could see my kids being part of it."

"Really?" This seemed to shock and fascinate him; she had his full attention now and again she found it slightly unnerving.

"There's a real movement to accept difference now," Hermione began, unable to hold eye contact while he focused on her so intently. She squeaked a patch of glass on her window clear with the edge of her hand as she spoke. "In the muggle world at least. I'm not sure how far it will go but, the kids, like Teddy, they think differently from us. They don't care about gender or lables, or at least they don't seem to. They really seem to value difference."

Hermione paused, thinking about how it always made her feel pessimistic. "It's one of the things I've found hard to adapt to. I grew up being cut down for being too clever, not fitting in with wizards because I was muggleborn, but not being able to live in the muggle world because magic is such a huge part of who I am. And now they all seem to think it is so great to be unique, which it is, but, I guess I'm just sad it wasn't like that for my generation."

"If there is one thing that I can understand, it's what it's like to not fit in," Sirius said in companionable commiseration.

"Mr. Popularity?" Hermione almost scoffed, she knew of course that he hadn't fit in at home, but why would he have wanted to?

"Yeah, only once I got to school," he said in a mildly defensive tone. "Once I had James," his face became rather wistful, eyes far away again. "He was the first person who ever – I don't even know how to explain it. He was just there, with me, no matter what I did, no matter how stupid," his lips curled in a fond grin. "Always to my right, James Potter."

Hermione's chest was suddenly tight, she was going to send him back to lose the person who'd changed his life. His smile faded as he asked. "Do you know much about my family?"

Hermione nodded. "Much more than I'd like. It must have been horrible growing up in that house."

"You've been to Grimmauld Place!?" he exclaimed, aghast, his voice loud in the confines of the car.

"Yes," Hermione confirmed, thinking that at least he would like what she told him next. "After your mother died, you turned it into the Headquarters for the Order of the Phoenix."

"Ha!" he burst out, starting to laugh, his hand coming up to pinch the bridge of his nose, like he was exasperated with himself. "Fuck, I'm hilarious. You have no idea how happy that makes me."

She wished it had made him happy in reality. She felt yet another stab of pain at the reminder that he was never really going to be happy again.

"But yes," he said, serious once more. "Growing up there was horrible. My father was … dreadful, brutal, and just … well … I'm sure you saw the scars," he finished uncomfortably, looking away again.

"On your back?" She had wondered about them yesterday, but she'd thought they had been from the war, not child abuse.

He nodded. "But that was only physical pain, right? I think my mother fucked me up worse," he tapped his temple with his index finger. "It took a long time for me to really trust people." Hermione felt the dread she was getting so used to as she watched him bare this little bit of his soul. Because unfortunately, it was trust that destroyed his life. "Being in Gryffindor, it didn't change me, but it let me be myself. I'd never been able to be myself before that. Not ever. I didn't even really know who I was. So yeah, being different? I get it."

Hermione gave him a sad smile, trying to keep all of her tangled guilt under control. "I wish you got to see this world properly. See how much we've changed it."

"Me too," he said fervently. "Have you had a lot to do with it? The changes?"

"Yes," she began, glad to move away from such a depressing topic. "I started in Control of Magical Creatures straight after the war. I did quite a bit for werewolves, in memory of Remus, started a free wolfsbane scheme, employment rights, and chipped away at all the discrimination woven through our laws. But I realised pretty quickly that I was going to have to shift to general legislation to make a real difference."

"That's so cool," Sirius said quietly, impressed. "I know I'm fighting too, but it all just seems so pointless when the real stuff, this stuff that you're talking about, we have no control over any of it."

"Welcome to your first existential crisis," Hermione said kindly, mainly because he was right; he didn't have any control.

He gave her a hopeless look, "What do I do about that?"

"I'm not sure what you would do," she said, "but generally, I drink." Her solution probably wasn't the best either, she did seem to turn to wine more often these days. Whether to celebrate or commiserate, a drink always seemed to help.

"You're a really terrible influence you know," Sirius said, lightening a bit as his tone turned teasing. "Corrupting even… my poor innocent soul."

"There are a lot of ways I would describe you," Hermione said, bemusedly, "but innocent certainly isn't one of them."

"I'm not that poor either," he chuckled to himself. "Home for a drink, then?" he added, rubbing his own patch of window clear. It was still raining, but not like before. Hermione nodded and reached out to wipe a clear area of the windshield so that she could drive again.

It was a slower ride home, the road was quite flooded, and when they turned in the driveway to Le Bon Côté the potholes in the limestone track were filled with milky water that splashed up the sides of the car as they bumped along. The little white house came into view, its bright garden looking rather battered, and Hermione saw there were leaves and small branches from the Ash tree all over the tiled roof and the yard where she parked, obviously knocked from the tree by the heavy rain.

But she smiled, a rainy evening while watching telly sounded excellent, maybe this could be a relaxing holiday after all.